Recently, in my search for more cyberpunk-esque books to consume I saw two different

recommendations for this little book. I figured, hey, it sounds interesting, I might as well give it a
shot. Honestly I didn't even check for reviews because I was book-high after just finishing Snow
Crash and was looking for the next great book.
Turns out the account that made both of those reviews pretty much exclusively make
recommendations for the book (my second mistake was not noticing this sooner). Even on a post
about someone feeling suicidal. I won't be revealing the accounts name, but I figure it's probably
the author.
So, because this guy is so intent on getting his book out there, I figured I’d help him out
and write a review so everyone here can get an idea of what the book is like.
The book follows the journey of Dante, a 13 year old kid who begins gee story living as
an orphan on a fishing ship that also serves as a sort of prison. Now, I'll admit the book has a
good start, with Dante lamenting his latrine duty, declaring that he'll find the meaning of life, and
then attempting to take control of the ship. It all sets up this history of Dante, who is really just a
kid, having been raised by the guys aboard the ship, who just wants to see the world, and figure
out who he is and what life's all about.
That, however, is where the positives of this story end.
Without spoiling the story for and potential readers, many of the books chapters are
punctuated by a life lesson Dante learns over the course of said chapter. Now, this isn't a terrible
way to structure the books core search themes into the story. However, the lessons Dante learns
are generic life advice that you've likely heard both somewhere else, and put more eloquently.
For instance, "Do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life." The second issue with
these lessons is that they seemed to be based in nothing, and have no effect on Dante's behavior
whatsoever. Again for instance, the previously mentioned example of one such lesson was
learned by Dante after a conversation with an old man important to the plot who, again without
spoiling anything, was doing what he was doing because of what's presented as a sense of a duty,
and a responsibility to humanity. Doesn’t exactly sound like a guy doing what he loves, does it?
And trust me, the connection here is even weaker in the book than I’ve presented it. Not to
mention the fact that the lessons Dante learns don't seem to incite the tiniest bit of change in him
at all. They don't really have a point.
Moving on, I believe literature to be a fluid thing, sure there are plenty of guidelines on
how to format your writing, indenting paragraphs, proper punctuation and tensing, but some of
these things, I believe, can be altered or turned on their head for the sake of the story. In short,
toying with the rules as written can, in some cases, make for an interesting layer of the narrative.
However, I feel like Mr. Garrido took this to a bit of an extreme, considering the sheer number of
seemingly random paragraphs without indents, errors in tense, spelling, punctuation, and the
totally nonsensical dialogue. (I.E. "I apologize." "You should be.")
Now, you may have already figured out that this is a self-published title, and I want to
make one thing clear. I don't have anything against self-publishing. I myself have self-published
and I know how hard it is to get your book noticed. There are plenty of hidden gems in the world
of self-published titles, this just isn't one of them.
But all in all, that about sums up my review of Dante and His Search for Meaning. I give
it a total rating of Dante's Search For a Good Book on a scale from the Divine Comedy to Devil
May Cry.